Governor’s Cup gets prime placement in Cape wrestling room 

In My Room - “Do my dreaming and my scheming. Lie awake and pray. Do my crying and my sighing. Laugh at yesterday.” – Beach Boys, 1963. Move over, Cape state championship team trophies from 2021 and 2022, the 2025 Beast of the East Governor’s Cup is coming between you on the shelf in the room of reverence. The Governor’s Cup is awarded to the Delaware team that scores the most points in the Beast of the East tournament. Cape had 57 in the event at the University of Delaware. The Vikings were followed by Delaware Military Academy with 48, Caesar Rodney with 32.5, Smyrna with 32.5 and Salesianum with 24. Cosmically connected, Cape’s beach boys from 2021 and 2022 were known as the Basement Boys because they worked out together in Uncle Buck’s basement. If you know, then you know.  

Silently heroic - I have been paying rapt attention to scholastic wrestling matches for a scary long time. I remember a light-middleweight, sinewy and stringy strong kid, from the BC era (Before Cape). He was often called for stalling when on offense, not as a strategy but rather he suffered from seizure clusters, was heavily medicated and would have petit mal seizures throughout the day. After beating a really tough kid who he had on lockdown for most of three periods, my guy came off the mat and stopped in front of me. I said, “Awesome job.” He then asked, “Did I have any seizures during my match?” The high school kid was dealing. He was self-aware, wanted to win, but didn’t want to look like the weird guy. I am a reflective quipster looking for one-liners. But I simply said, “You were fine. So strong. No seizure that I could see.” This young man was so cool because he took the trolley to school. In fact, after his match, he asked me for $5 because he had forgotten his fare (his father was rich, by the way). I told him, “But the trolley only costs a dollar.” “I know,” he said. “But I usually stop to get a bite to eat.” 

Dad bods - “I can think of younger days when living for my life was everything a man could want to do. I could never see tomorrow. But I was never told about the sorrows.” – Bee Gees, 1971. Phillip Rivers at 24 looks different at 44.  Creative signs in the stands at Lucas Oil Stadium Monday night described the folksy Rivers, father of 10 children and grandfather of one, suggesting Rivers is rocking the dad bod – just thick through the trunk and no longer lithe and lean. Culture creates concepts like dad bods and mom jeans, which sounds like a country song. The ref and reporter – Biff Lee and Fredman – rocked dad bods back in the day before a Cape football game. Both men were “mean motor scooters and bad go getters.” – Lovin Spoonful, 1965. Rivers can no longer put touch on the deep ball, but landing is a runway to the danger zone for his continued orthopaedic ambulation without taking a walker on the wild side. Biff Lee died in December 2014 at the age of 66. Biff was a football official for 48 years. 

The call on the field - NFL replay review has gotten so annoying and so precisely imprecise that I yearn for the days of human error and zero commentators saying they need incontrovertible evidence to overturn the call on the field. The Detroit Lions got worked over by preciseness at the end of their loss to the Steelers, having two touchdowns called back for offensive pass interference in the closing seconds. That reminds me of meteorologists predicting weather. With all the technology, their success rate is not 100%. 

Your don’t know that - I was searching for something I wrote, then AI entered the game. I was reading stuff about myself I didn’t know, then I realized that AI was blending the three Dave Fredericks, including Davey, Dave and myself, into one person. It ended with, “Despite being blunt and gruff at times, he’s deeply loved in the community, earning nicknames like Fredman and being seen as a steadfast Cape guy.” I was just researching why my former athlete and lifelong friend Randy Johnson always called me “Friendly Dave.” I think it came from a story that Jerry McGuire of the Delaware State News wrote in the early ‘80s. But you know you’ve arrived when AI is talking smack about you. 

Snippets - The Lewes Polar Bears will jump into the ocean on New Year’s Day 2026. The first LPB jump was in February 1982 by the quintet of Dave Frederick, John Ellsworth, Dennis Forney, George Pepper and Tim Pfeiffer. I stopped plunging after decades when I suffered a third-degree hamstring tear running out of a 38-degree ocean. Someone made a porker and sauerkraut German joke, but it seemed like fun at the time. Jameson Tingle committed to the University of Delaware, where his Uncle Trip started at left tackle on the 2003 national championship team. Grandpa Nick is also a Blue Hen graduate. Another four years of tailgating awaits the family. Go on now, git!